tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2593256949311598537.post1125397508213484081..comments2023-05-28T02:05:07.525-07:00Comments on The Wilder Coast: Vantage: Wind and EcstasyMelinahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16957983479473967228noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2593256949311598537.post-32824632429754284022011-04-23T19:40:59.345-07:002011-04-23T19:40:59.345-07:00I love the descriptions of driving in the car. I c...I love the descriptions of driving in the car. I could just melt into it.<br />Good luck with the hurricane!<br /><br />JessJessicahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03698426123500265164noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2593256949311598537.post-4198317074469206352011-04-18T17:38:42.686-07:002011-04-18T17:38:42.686-07:00I have to tell you, after you commented a few mont...I have to tell you, after you commented a few months back, I started reading your blog. Your writing is riveting, and I am delightfully amused by your adventures. I love that Dig and I share you as a reader too. Thank you for your kind comment and know that I am reading along for all your posts! (loved your descriptions in the last one...and the scavenger birthday hunt your friends put on for you). Keep writing!Kellehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00341972643290993879noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2593256949311598537.post-64295911169112632802011-04-17T21:00:25.121-07:002011-04-17T21:00:25.121-07:00The neighborhood parents disapproved of the way my...The neighborhood parents disapproved of the way my parents raised me. Particularly that they not only let me roam free and wild, but that their children quickly became cohorts in my adventures. Probably because I had fun and my kind of fun didn't involve anyone's mouth getting washed out with soap.<br /><br />I remember building a cardboard fort once with a window in a ditch. The plan was to throw rocks out the window at the hornets nest across the street in the opposing ditch. I don't recall there being any consequences to this bright idea, but I also couldn't say why we did it. I suppose it simply seemed like a fun idea at the time.<br /><br />I can't actually remember any of the reasoning I had back then, but there probably wasn't any. I have memories of wandering the hundreds of acres of woodland that was my backyard, only to come out somewhere else and wander home.<br /><br />My father was an airline pilot and was often gone for days at a time. He would come home to tree forts in the front yard with contractor garbage bags for a roof or the entire basement covered in tinfoil in an attempt to build a giant antenna for the world-band radio.<br /><br />He grew up in Massachusetts, in a suburb of Boston, son of an airline pilot. His parents, however, were from northern Maine; land of wilderness, potatoes and logging.<br /><br />I asked my mother today about their choices that led to this childhood of mine. She said that when they decided to start a family, they agreed they wanted it to happen where my mother had grown up. Because here, there was plenty of forests, streams and a lake for a child to explore and be wild. She said that they acknowledged that there was a certain amount of danger in letting us go free, but that there was in life too, and this way we would learn to get ourselves out of predicaments.<br /><br />I joke sometimes about being raised 'free-range.' It wasn't a common term then. The line seemed be drawn between those children whose parents would let them play in the fort I built out of pallets, plywood and cinder blocks; and those whose parents would not.<br /><br />I took it all for granted, but in a healthy way. It became a solid footing for solving my own problems and being confident in my ability to persevere. My mother said certain boundaries were set low, with the expectation they would be exceeded to a certain degree. I look back at everything we did alone; wandering the woods, swimming and sailing, biking the blueberry fields; and I recognize it was perhaps a rare way of being raised, based on my sampling my friends over the years.<br /><br />I can't imagine it any other way. Those years and those places are a part of me and I'm consequently forever bonded not just to them, but to being a good steward of that way of life.Bryan McLellanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16010257198683465593noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2593256949311598537.post-81645978103659956522011-04-17T11:17:37.981-07:002011-04-17T11:17:37.981-07:00can't wait to see more imagescan't wait to see more imagesAdriana Irishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00738352067461819081noreply@blogger.com